Christian Faith and the Problem of Evil by Peter van Inwagen

Author:Peter van Inwagen [Inwagen, Peter van]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Christian Books & Bibles, Christian Living, Theology, Systematic, Religion & Spirituality, Religious Studies, Philosophy, Religious Studies & Reference
Amazon: B004D2AZ7Y
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
Published: 2004-09-28T22:00:00+00:00

Dialogism and the Spiral of Change

In relation to the curvilinear movement of the phases, there are contradictions in the worldviews of both women. For example, Venita does not question the discrepancy in the way God appears to divvy out justice to men as opposed to women. Elsewhere, in parts of the conversation not recorded above, both illustrate women's fundamental sexism against women though they decry the sexism of men. ("You can't trust a woman," Venita says; Carmen adds: "Women are conniving.")

Yet Carmen and Venita are learning from one another. They are clearly attending to relationality by listening carefully to one another, agreeing or accepting, modifying or yielding, challenging and meeting one another's challenges as they jointly construct (within the confines of this conversation at least) a mutually acceptable worldview composed of some clearly differing worldviews or languages. This creates the spiral activity and the "energy" or impetus to move their levels of perception or awareness.

Important moments in the conversation happen at specific junctures or locations. Carmen adds positively to the movement in lines 22, 28-30, and 38. Generally speaking, in these moments, she is applying social analysis or cultural critiques to religious matters. Venita engages and responds respectively beginning in lines 22 and 39. It is as if the exchanges are being meshed together and a spiral motion is being created.

Notice that, between lines 36-37, between lines 46-47, and certainly by the last utterance, Carmen and Venita are in positions of agreement and accordance: a kind of co-production made by acts of negotiations, respect, or reciprocity/mutuality. Conceived broadly, with Carmen's help, Venita moves from articulating a relatively uncritical religious and secular view to a more fully critical view. By the end of the conversation, she evidences more social and spiritual awareness. With Venita's help, Carmen moves from articulating an ambiguous or uncertain spiritual sense of self to a more fully authoritative spiritual stance. They are able to do this because the energy of each other's contributions - the dialogism - helps them to recast their initial articulations into language more selfconsciously aware and mutually-accommodating. In short, together they create a new world.

Interestingly, Carmen and Venita are able to imagine this new world because they subvert traditional formulations about religion, an institution (they imply) that unduly influences gender roles and relations. In effect, two very religious women use resistance or subversion to reorder their worlds. Through the use of hybrid language forms and ensuing changes or shifts in meaning, they render God as female and her justice as sure. The effect of the converging and conflating of languages, fashioning a hybrid of sorts, creates a spiraling effect that results in both women (to different degrees) moving out of Phase Two concepts and into those of Phase Three by the end of the conversation.

As I have argued, some battered women move away from traditional explanations of the nature of their suffering and towards some alternative theodicies. Indeed, they may develop their own "local theologies" to make sense of their situations. The conversation

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.